As the value and use of information continues to increase, individuals and businesses seek additional ways to process and store information. One option is an Information Handling System (IHS). An IHS generally processes, compiles, stores, and/or communicates information or data for business, personal, or other purposes. Because technology and information handling needs and requirements may vary between different applications, IHSs may also vary regarding what information is handled, how the information is handled, how much information is processed, stored, or communicated, and how quickly and efficiently the information may be processed, stored, or communicated. Variations in IHSs allow for IHSs to be general or configured for a specific user or specific use such as financial transaction processing, airline reservations, enterprise data storage, global communications, etc. In addition, IHSs may include a variety of hardware and software components that may be configured to process, store, and communicate information and may include one or more computer systems, data storage systems, and/or networking systems.
Fault-tolerant IHSs provide network connection redundancy by designating a primary Network Interface Card (NIC) and utilizing a secondary NIC as backup; both NICs dedicated to communications performed by a host processor within the IHS. When the primary NIC loses its link (e.g., becomes inoperable), the IHS's host network interface will fail over the host processor's network traffic to the secondary or backup NIC. Accordingly, in these conventional systems, it is necessary that a standby or redundant NIC be dedicated to the host processor.
The inventors hereof have recognized, however, that this additional hardware (that is, the dedicated or secondary NIC) presents a cost burden to end-customers.